Ex-507th member Jessica Lynch: 'I look at everything in a whole new light'

Former Pfc. Jessica Lynch is seen with Pfc. Lori Piestewa at Fort Bliss the day before their deployment to the Middle East in February 2003. The Army notified the Piestewa family in Tuba City, Ariz., on April 4, 2003, that they had recovered Lori's remains after rescuing Jessica Lynch, who was in Piestewa's company in Iraq. (The Associated Press file photo)

Former prisoner of war Jessica Lynch still counts her blessings and tries hard to embrace a normal life after emerging as the most celebrated soldier of the early war in Iraq 10 years ago.

Lynch became a household name and the media face of U.S. forces in Iraq. She was propelled into the international spotlight after the Army released night-vision footage of what the military portrayed as a dramatic rescue.

"I'm to the point where now I'm doing OK," Lynch said in a telephone conversation from Palestine, W.Va., her hometown. "I still live in the same little ol' town."

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Lynch, 29, was a member of the 507th Maintenance Company once based at Fort Bliss. Ten years ago, she and six other United States soldiers were taken prisoner when Iraqis ambushed a 507th convoy in the Iraqi desert at Nasiriyah.

"This could have been so much worse," Lynch said. "At least I got to come home. And I'm able to continue my life."

The first military reports portrayed Lynch, a private first class and supply clerk at the time, as a hero who suffered various wounds as she valiantly fought off the enemy.

In reality, she was severely injured when her Humvee was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade and rammed another vehicle.

In congressional testimony and in her book, "I Am a Soldier, Too," Lynch said she never fired a shot because her gun jammed. She later criticized the military for exag gerating accounts of her capture and rescue.

Over the years, Lynch has credited her fellow soldiers who died in the ambush as the real heroes.

U.S. forces rescued Lynch on April 1, 2003, at a hospital in Iraq. The rescue was later made into a television movie.

These days, Lynch is more at ease traveling, hanging out with family and looking after 6-year-old daughter Dakota Ann Robinson, the kindergartner named after Lynch's best friend, Pfc. Lori Ann Piestewa, the driver of the Humvee and the first American woman killed during the U.S. invasion of Iraq.

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Ramón Rentería

"She's doing great. She's healthy, happy and a growing kid," Lynch said about her daughter. Lynch and her boyfriend, Wes Robinson, the girl's father, have not yet made firm plans to marry.

"Perhaps someday," Lynch said. "It's in the works."

Lynch still stays in touch with other POWs formerly associated with the 507th Maintenance Company.

"It's important to stay in touch with them," she said. "They were there and felt the same kind of pain that I went through. It's nice to have the support of someone who knows what happened."

On this 10th anniversary of the start of the war in Iraq, Lynch and other former POWs planned to participate in an annual sunrise tribute to Piestewa and other fallen soldiers in Arizona.

In 2011, Lynch received a degree in elementary education and achieved a dream. She had enlisted in the Army hoping to earn college tuition to study to become a teacher. Now she substitute teaches while continuing to work on a master's degree in communications studies.

Lynch said it took a while to adjust to sitting in class with "a bunch of 18-year-olds."

According to published reports, the former POW blended in at West Virginia University at Parkersburg without much notice. Lynch had received extensive media coverage after her rescue and recovery.

"Once I got to know the students, it was just like any other day," Lynch said. "Getting around campus was probably the hardest."

Lynch limps and has back problems, a reminder of injuries she sustained during the 2003 ambush that propelled the now-disbanded 507th Maintenance Company into the history books.

Is Jessica Lynch destined to become a schoolteacher?

"I'm not sure yet," she replied.

For Lynch, it is difficult to forget the ambush on the 507th Maintenance Company convoy. She still receives fan mail and constantly juggles requests for media interviews and speaking engagements.

Experiencing war and the uncertainties of being a POW has caused Lynch to re-evaluate her priorities.

"I look at everything in a whole new light because of what happened," Lynch said. "Every day is about perseverance. There is not much other than the physical pain that brings me down."

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